The Boy Who Fell Before
by mickeylover303
Summary: With Naruto, Sakura doesn't know how to do a lot of things.  But maybe it's okay if she still wants to try.


**To speak to you...**

"I like you," Naruto says, smiles in a hesitant way that somehow still makes him look so sure, but all Sakura can pay attention to is the crowd of girls watching.

They laugh and point, and Ino laughs with them because this year she's different even though she's the same when it's just the two of them.

She doesn't want Naruto to like her. She doesn't want to be noticed by the boy with the stupid goggles that make him look ridiculous and the stupid orange jumpsuit that makes him stand out no matter how hard she tries not to look.

"I really do." Naruto pushes up the goggles on his head, squints at her as he pulls on the white collar of his jacket that's stained with broth from the miso ramen he ate earlier, and Sakura wants to scream because even though he fails at the simplest things that everyone else gets, _she_ can't get how he doesn't see why those girls are laughing at them.

Just like he didn't get why she started to wear the headband that Ino said made her look prettier, made her forehead less noticeable, and why she didn't have to explain herself for wearing it because a boy like him, Sakura didn't—still doesn't—want to be pretty for Naruto.

She bites the inside of her cheek. Through the quieting crowd, she sees Sasuke coming her way. She grips the bottom of her shirt, uses it to dry slick fingers because she told Ino this morning she'd confess to Sasuke first, before any of the other girls did, and she's not going to let those three stupid words from Naruto ruin the moment she's been waiting for all day.

Her heart thumps in her chest, starts beating so loud she almost thinks Naruto can hear it, too. Maybe he does.

And in that moment, when Sasuke is walking by them, Naruto turns to look before Sakura raises her arm and waves to Sasuke.

"Sasuke-kun! Sasuke-kun, you look..."

Naruto scowls as Sasuke keeps walking, when Sakura holds her hand to her chest, but his face softens when he turns back to her.

"He probably...he probably couldn't hear me," she mumbles. "If I was closer, he—Sasuke-kun didn't hear me. That's all."

"...I heard you, Sakura-chan."

She holds her hands to her head and shuts her eyes because it's the only way she knows how to make reason Sasuke didn't hear her go away. Naruto's not the one who's supposed to have heard her. He's not supposed to look at her like that when he's not even the boy she likes.

"Just go away, Naruto! Go away and stop bothering with me with your stupid confessions I don't want to hear because I don't like you like that!"

Her eyes stay closed. She doesn't have to keep them open to see the flinch she's seen too many times before because she's turned him down so many times already, but she peeks anyway, with one eye almost open, watches as suddenly, now Naruto notices the crowd around them.

The girls start laughing again. Naruto's eyes go wide. His skin is overrun with a red that starts from the tips of his ears and disappears beneath his jacket. He wipes his face with his sleeve, hides trembling lips behind an orange that clashes with his skin.

"Sakura-chan, I..."

He turns away, a sharp about-face that almost has him tripping over his feet with a hasty walk that quickly becomes a run.

The crowd continues to laugh and point, and Ino continues with them, but Sakura lowers her hands, watches Naruto until he's out of her sight.

**To trust you...**

"...does your arm still hurt?" Naruto fiddles with the lining from the pocket of his pants, holds it out then stuffs it back inside.

Sakura rotates her shoulder and flexes her fingers. "Maybe a little sore, but it's not serious."

"Still..."

"Nothing that won't go away. The skin's already healed, so it won't hurt to spar with you today."

At the edge of the training grounds, he stops. The fingers curled into his palms are held at his sides, but his hands still shake even though the rest of him is so very still. "I'm sorry, Sakura-chan."

"Naruto..."

She falters at his pinched expression, searches his face for clear eyes this one time he won't let her see. It's easier to think of him now rather than how she saw him then. They're both old enough to be different, but when she sees him like this, she can only think of all those other times, the kinds of instances she tries to make up for without telling him—the constant attempts at apologies that can't be said because otherwise he wouldn't accept them.

And when he lowers his head, his entire body rigid, she knows she can't accept something she doesn't feel she deserves.

"I didn't mean to hurt you like that. I didn't mean to—"

"You weren't..." She pulls her glove over her hand, pressing her lips together so she won't frown. "It was something else. You weren't yourself. That—I knew that wasn't you."

"...did you really? Because I—" He swallows. "I don't want you to be afraid of me."

"I don't think I can be afraid of you."

He lifts his head, watches her with glassy eyes.

She pretends not to see the wetness on his cheeks, tries to force herself to laugh and covers her mouth when she realises she doesn't have to. "Because you're still Naruto, aren't you?"

"Sakura-chan..."

"No matter what happened then, you're still you, and I..."

He sniffs and wipes his sleeve across his face, smiles through the tears that continue to fall, and his smile grows wider because she's already smiling, too.

**To live for you...**

"I like you, Naruto."

"Sakura-chan..."

"And now that you know—" Sakura lowers her head, clenches the fists at her sides. "Now that you know I like you, there's no reason for you go after Sasuke-kun."

Naruto blinks, tilts his head to the side, then scratches the back of his neck. "But I already told you I would."

Sakura shuts her eyes, shakes her head. "And now I'm saying you don't have to—"

"I promised you. Whatever it takes, I'm not going to let him make you cry anymore."

There's something in his tone that makes her look up, makes her wish she didn't because the grim determination in his eyes reaps a chill inside her. It's a flicker of something she can't place, foreign yet so intricately a well-founded part of him she can't remember not seeing.

"Even if I have to drag him to Konoha with my teeth stuck in his skin," he says, "I'm getting Sasuke back for you."

And then the chill becomes a fear. This unnerving fear, horrible and overwhelming, unfurling her hands, she watches through distorted vision this side of him she's seen before but never really knew.

"Even though I first said it a while ago..." He turns away but keeps his head held high. "I know it's taking a little longer, but believe that I'm still going to do it. So you can't give up on me, Sakura-chan, okay."

"He's going to kill you, Naruto! Sasuke-kun's not—he isn't going to—"

"I won't hurt him if that's what you're worried about," he says, soft but loud enough to cut through her voice. He scratches his temple and turns back to her with one corner of his mouth lifted up. "...at least not too bad."

She grits her teeth, curls her fingers into fists again. Three years hasn't changed him from that uncool boy with the stupid goggles who doesn't get whatever everybody already knows. It takes too much not to punch him, not to scream at him to stop being that boy who never gives up because one day he's never going to get a chance to try again, and she doesn't want that day be to this soon.

But she already knew he wouldn't listen, knows not to say anything else because Naruto already talks too much for the both of them.

She lowers her gaze to the ground, catches the glimpse of colour peering from beneath his dull cloak. She wants to keep him in it while she's gone, wants to hide him in a barrier of her own making until there's no Sasuke to bring back because the peeks of orange still stand out too bright against the white of the snow surrounding them.

**To love you...**

The gravel is a veneer on Naruto's skin, thin with edges sharp and jagged that prick Sakura's palms when she reaches over him. Her hands cover the tattered pieces of oranges and greys scarce over a bare chest, warm despite the water stained red seeping through her fingers that makes her shiver.

The pressure from her teeth pressed against her lip begins to hurt, and she bites down harder because Naruto still isn't moving.

Kakashi's hand on her shoulder tightens her grip around the hole in Naruto's jacket, makes her turn away from the hollow of Sasuke's hand through Naruto's chest that won't fully heal.

Her body hunches forward, and she starts to tremble. Her grip on Naruto's jacket loosens, but she doesn't let go, doesn't open her eyes until she feels the absence of the hand on her shoulder replaced by the shaky fingers around her wrist.

She sniffs, looks down with wide eyes blurred by the water falling over them.

Naruto looks up with a steady grin, a sureness in his eyes not offset by the blood trailing down the corner of his mouth. She blinks at the drops of rain sliding down her cheeks, returns his grin with a wavering smile that tastes salty when she licks her lips.

His voice is scratchy, but the familiar sound of her name is soothing, and she wraps her arms around him, holds him, and lets her head fall heavy on his chest.


End file.
